Guest Commentary
Fire Suppression, Federal Budgets, and Future Fires
By Guest Writer, 1-10-09
With fresh snow piling up on the peaks, and the 2009 Montana legislature getting underway in Helena, now is the right time to have a sensible discussion regarding wildfire and fire management in Montana. The cool, wet spring of 2008 made last year’s fire season a mild one, but last year’s lazy summer should not lull us into forgetting that wildfire is a permanent concern for Montanans, and increasingly is the 800 pound gorilla looming over our state budgets. Wildfire will return next summer, or perhaps the following one, and conditions are right for a big year.
Thankfully the stage was set for constructive talks about wildfire this winter when the Montana Fire Suppression Committee released its long-awaited recommended changes to fire management laws in Montana. Although some of the proposed laws lean the wrong direction, the majority of the committee’s recommendations are needed.
At the top of any legislator’s agenda this year should be serious consideration of those proposals that are geared towards the protection of communities and firefighters. In order to keep the Montana legislature productive and effective, it is important that we not get bogged down debating time-consuming, costly proposals that seek to stop all wildfires, because it’s simply not possible or desirable.
Like rain in Seattle, wildland fire is a fundamental part of Montana’s landscapes. But over the last 25 years fuel accumulation, longer, hotter fire seasons, and an increasing amount of homes built in the wildland urban interface (WUI) have created a recipe for putting homes and communities at risk.
The Fire Suppression Committee identified that our best chance for protecting communities is to focus fuel reduction work around homes. Several proposed laws would encourage fuel reduction efforts near structures and communities. Proposed regulations would encourage smart future planning and provide incentives to help communities Firewise and thin fuels in the critical 100 – 200 feet surrounding existing homes.
Forest thinning efforts on lands far from communities is no guarantee of reduced fire threat to communities. While thinning may change fire behavior, it will not stop the spread of wildfire. Indeed under some conditions, harvesting timber can exacerbate the spread of fire by increasing wind speeds through the forest and increasing surface fuel loading of dry woody debris. Worse, ill-placed fuel reduction efforts draw attention and funds away from homes and communities, putting people at risk.
That said, targeted thinning and prescribed fire use in specific forest types can reduce the risk of catastrophic fire and restore the natural resilience of some forest types to fire. However, restoration efforts cannot be done under emergency conditions and should be performed only with long-term objectives.
Far from communities, prescribed ‘wildland fire use’ (allowing natural fires to burn where there is no threat to communities and under appropriate weather conditions) works to restore historical conditions to our forests and make them more resilient and resistant to future catastrophic fires; thus increasing public safety while reducing costs in the coming years.
With fire suppression efforts now consuming half of the Forest Service’s total budget every year, and the Fire Suppression Committee predicting an eventual $200 million liability in a single fire season, now is the time to combat wildfire smarter instead of harder. Allowing nonthreatening fires to burn will reduce state wide fire fighting costs and allow federal and state agencies to focus efforts on the important fires that threaten communities.
Focusing only on fire suppression during a time of increasing fire occurrence will not prove sustainable or effective. Near communities, aggressive fuels treatment and active fire suppression should be our focus. Laws should be passed that yield smart planning in exurban areas, and empower homeowners to protect themselves by encouraging them to make their communities Firesafe. Farther from communities, prescribed and wildland fire must be used as a tool to restore forests and reduce future suppression costs.
Montanans can work toward creating fire-resistant communities in healthy, fire-resilient landscapes. The state Fire Suppression Committee should be applauded for coming to this important conclusion.
Thomas H. DeLuca, Ph.D. is a senior scientist with the Wilderness Society in Bozeman where he specializes on issues in forest ecology, land resources, and environmental sustainability.
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Why should we worry all that much about the neo-frontiersmen who move into the edge of the fores and then demand that our taxes protect them from fire?
My property taxes go to support volunteer firemen; but my federal taxes are not intended to underwrite the adventures of
Joe and Jo Oligarch who can afford to build a summer vacation show home in our boondocks...
Thom:
You wrote "While thinning may change fire behavior, it will not stop the spread of wildfire. " Yet, I've read of actual examples from up in the Libby area where fires have burned into thinned areas and dropped to the ground, changing from a crown fire to a low-intensity ground fire. Isn't that stopping the spread, in effect? Thanks for a thought-provoking article.
Jedediah, What about the communities that have been in place since the 1800's? Warren, Idaho has been continuously occupied since 1862, Burgdorf since 1864, Secesh 1893, Yellow Pine 1886. The Forest Service has only been in these areas since 1905. Part of the problem in our area stems from the 1930's when the Forest Service and CCC came in and planted lodgepole pines at high density in an area that had previously been mainly Ponderosa pine. That makes the cabins in the area more vulnerable to fire. In protecting the cabins in Secesh in 2007 a major Chinook Salmon spawning area was protected. There are many springs that feed the Secesh River in that area. I don't know what the consequences will be of removing so much vegetation on those springs. At least there are still some trees along the river to provide shade. I'm fortunate in that I have 5 acres. The area around my cabin was determined to be adequately cleared so that the FS crews felt they didn't need to put any sprinklers up on my property. I still had trees that burned and the fire did cross the river from my property. It's intersting that one person was able to contain a fire that started in roughly the same are as the 2007 Loon Fire in 1905. If you would have been on the ground to watch the management of the fire you would see that that is where the problem lies. Managers are brought in that do not know the vegatation or terrain. The crews are given maps that only show some of the roads. They kept telling us that the fire would lie down when it hit the 2000 burn areas. We told them that was dry fuel and would burn hot. Then they told us that they measured some of the highest temperatures ever measured when the fires got into the old burns. They told us the grass was still green in Secesh Meadow so they didn't need to burn it. We told them it wasn't grass and it would burn across water in May. They lost a tent when it burned and would have lost more structures if we didn't have helicopters. It's amazing how the states have healthier forests with more diversity and a much smaller percentage burned each year while managing for timber/revenue generation.
Comment By Cindy, 1-12-09There are many areas of diseased timber, bug killed, along with the burned timber that has never been removed. Fully matured trees also are dieing out and all of these no matter where they are will cause fires that burns hotter than a healthy forest will burn. These areas should be logged to allow the new healthy trees to live and grow. Many times I have stood at the top of a high ridge and looked at a forest that is not the bright green but instead has that tinge of brown, all dieing and explosive to a spark. Many claim that this is natures way to cleanse the earth, this is certainly true, however I can tell you of areas where the earth has been scorched so badly that it is now sterile, or only weeds and noxious vegetation grows. Lets be good stewards, selectively cut and not destroy like the industry once did and in some places on private lands are doing now. I hate the tearing up of the land as much as you, but also I know there are things we must do and can do without the damage that has been done in the past.
I feel sorry for those who condemn those of us who have lived most of our lives in the back country. Not in an expensive week end cabin or multimillion dollar cabin, but a neat little home where kids can grow, learn to work and have the freedoms so many miss out on by having only pavement to play on. These people who live here are the very ones who really appreciate what God has given us and takes care of it knowing what is good for it and what destroys it. Just letting it go doing nothing will destoy it. So many believe, "let Mother Nature take care of it". That isn't the way a good Mother takes care of her child, why should we do it to that which we are in charge of, our forests.
The Senate worked sunday night to pass 2 million acres of Wilderness protection. The first Senate vote. Like they have their collective eye on the ball, right? Palestine, Iran, Iraq, Afghanistan, Wall Street, education, medical bills, Recession, and we got 2 million acres of new fuels to let burn in the WFU and AMR process. If it were not so sad, it would be laughable. You try to teach kids to have their priorities right, and then the Senate spends one of its two days a week they work on keeping a broke country from developing land?? You elected the idiots. So celebrate all the way to Depression.
Maybe next sunday, they will work again and budget a dollar two eighty-eight for fire suppression. Or not.
My tax dollars should be used to help sustain forests, wildlife, and clean water across our public lands. They should not be focused on reducing fire hazard around someone's house because they chose to build in a fire-dependent ecosystem. I support my tax dollars being used to fund projects that provide wood products and reduce the threat of catastrophic fire whether that be close to communities or in the hinterlands. Less catastrophic fire means more sustainable forests, wildlife and clean water.
Comment By tomgok, 1-15-09The answer may lie somewhere between. The large areas of western forests that have fallen victim to pine beetle will provide a more fire prone environment while they are in that "red-needle" phase. Once the trees are dead and have lost their needles they become more resistant to fire than most green timber that will still have the volatile compounds the needles represent. Unsightly yes, but not waiting to explode. The work that homeowners do to provide an area near thier home where few if any materials remain that will carry and hold fire embers will do more to protect their homes than clearing whole areas of the forest to prevent fire.
Look at Colorado just last week. Homes threatened not by fire coming out of the forest but from dry, winter grasslands on fire that could then spread to homes adjacent to those areas that really are just another type of "fuel" to most fires. I know it's not as dramatic as a raging wilderness, big timber conflagration but the fires that are destroying homes in California and other fire prone environments have more to do with how and where our homes are built and furnished and less to do with what is burning in the forest.